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Harriet Harman casts doubt over Ed Miliband's economic credibility Harriet Harman casts doubt over Ed Miliband's economic credibility
(about 1 hour later)
Labour’s acting leader has admitted that a significant number of supporters were relieved when the party lost the election. Many Labour supporters feel relieved the party is not in power under Ed Miliband, the acting leader, Harriet Harman, has said.
Harriet Harman cast doubts over Ed Miliband’s economic credibility with the public and said the party had taken the wrong message to voters. In a frank assessment, Harman said Miliband’s personal performance and lack of trust towards the party on the economy “combined together” to contribute to the election defeat.
Many voters felt the party was failing to reach out to them because it raised issues they could not necessarily relate to such as zero-hours contracts, the living wage and food banks, she told the Independent. Her analysis counters the argument made by some of Miliband’s allies that his election bid failed because “lazy Labour” supporters did not turn out to vote.
Related: The undoing of Ed Miliband – and how Labour lost the election | Patrick Wintour Speaking to the Independent, Harman said: “Sometimes after an election, you get a sense that people think: ‘Oh my God, that is terrible, what a disaster’. A lot of people felt that, because we got nearly 40,000 new party members who were very disappointed.
Harman has brought in Deborah Mattinson, Gordon Brown’s former pollster, to give a candid assessment of what went wrong in the runup to the general election. Miliband’s personal performance will be analysed along with the party’s lack of economic credibility with voters. “But there is an even greater number of people, even though they were not enthusiastic about David Cameron or the Tories, who feel relieved that we are not in government. We have got to address it. It was not a blip.”
“The two combined together. People tend to like a leader they feel is economically competent,” Harman told the newspaper. The acting leader made the comments after bringing in Deborah Mattinson, Gordon Brown’s former pollster, to assess what went wrong in the runup to the general election, looking at the performance of the leader and economic credibility.
Early responses to focus groups, staged as part of the inquiry into the humiliating election defeat, found relief among some voters that the party had lost. A supporter in London’s Ealing Central and Acton constituency said they were “a little bit disappointed and a little bit relieved”, a view that was echoed across the country, according to the Independent. “The two combined together,” Harma said. “People tend to like a leader they feel is economically competent.”
Harman said: “Sometimes after an election, you get a sense that people think ‘Oh my God, that is terrible, what a disaster.’ That’s what a lot of people felt because we got nearly 40,000 new members who were very disappointed. But there is an even greater number of people, even though they were not enthusiastic about the Tories, who feel relieved that we are not in government. We have got to address it. It was not a blip.” Early focus groups conducted by Mattinson’s team found relief among some voters that the party had lost.
People tend to like a leader they feel is economically competent One Labour supporter in London’s Ealing Central and Acton constituency said they were “a little bit disappointed and a little bit relieved”, a view that was echoed across the country, according to the Independent.
Labour held 6m doorstep conversations with voters but the campaign was worth little because it failed to deliver what voters wanted, she said. Harman said a common problem across Britain was that voters felt the party “doesn’t talk about me” and it was seen as supporting “people on benefits” but not those who “work hard”. Harman said voters had felt the party “doesn’t talk about me” and was seen as supporting people on benefits but not those who “work hard”.
She said: “It doesn’t matter how many leaflets you deliver if the message is not right.” Harman said it would be better to have “some turbulence” now than to “paper over the cracks”. Warning her party to expect more painful analysis, she said it would be better to have some turbulence now than to “paper over the cracks”.
“Sometimes after a big general election defeat, some people take lessons that protect their own involvement in the campaign,” said Harman. “They don’t want things looked at because they feel defensive. Others want to find things that support what they want the party to do in the future. “Sometimes after a big general election defeat, some people take lessons that protect their own involvement in the campaign,” Harman said. “They don’t want things looked at because they feel defensive. Others want to find things that support what they want the party to do in the future.
“It is really important for the party that it is not defensive about the past but is absolutely honest and clear-eyed and faces up to the truth of what people are saying.”“It is really important for the party that it is not defensive about the past but is absolutely honest and clear-eyed and faces up to the truth of what people are saying.”
Her warning echoes that of Labour’s former communications chief Alistair Campbell, who said the party should prepare for soul-searching.
Speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show on Sunday, Campbell said: “We are in big trouble, and we are in big trouble in the UK, which is why this leadership election is very, very important. I wish we were having the election at the end of the debate, not instead of the debate. But we have to understand this may not be the bottom.”
Most of the party’s biggest politicians have now given their verdicts on what they believe went wrong with the election campaign, including the five leadership candidates Andy Burnham, Yvette Cooper, Liz Kendall, Mary Creagh and Jeremy Corbyn.
Related: The undoing of Ed Miliband – and how Labour lost the election | Patrick Wintour
In another major intervention, Tristram Hunt, the shadow education secretary, has written in the Guardian that Miliband allowed himself to be “perceived as uninterested in schools policy”.
He wrote: “In our increasingly presidential politics, the media refracts every issue through the party leader’s personal capital. This, coupled with sincere concerns about “initiative-itus” and teacher exhaustion, tempered our radicalism, allowing the Tories to seize far too much of the education mantle.”
Hunt said Labour “muddled its priorities with the tuition fees cut”.
“There are strong economic arguments for investing in higher education and the current policy loading massive debt upon the taxpayer,” he wrote. “But poor children in Stoke-on-Trent start school two years behind their peers in leafier parts of the country. Eighty per cent of the GCSE attainment gap is present by age seven. If our main goal is eradicating educational inequality, then our investment priority must always be the early years.”